[B-Greek] Matt 27.30 Why the Imperfect ETUPTON
Wayne Leman
wayne_leman at sil.org
Wed Aug 22 19:21:39 EDT 2007
Mitch, Greek doesn't have Past, Present, or Future tenses. It only has two
time categories which have traditionally been called tenses, Imperfect and
Aorist. But they do not reflect past, present, or future action as English
tenses do. So when we look at the "tenses" of this verb, the Imperfect of
ETUPTON may indicate that the beating action continued for a period of time
(or was "incomplete"), from the point of view of the author. This is
actually closer to the linguistic category of aspect than tense, a topic
which has been discussed here many times in the past.
Wayne
----
Wayne Leman
Better Bibles Blog:
http://englishbibles.blogspot.com
>
> KAI EMPTUSANTES EIS AUTON ELABON TON KALAMON KAI
> ETUPTON EIS THN KEFALHN AUTOU
>
> Why is ETUPTON in the Imperfect and not the Present?
> These guys grab (ELABON) the staff/reed and then
> subsequently begin beating him. So, should we not
> expect the Present or even the Future tense, not the
> Past tense? The beating comes later after they pick up
> this staff.
>
> Mitch Larramore
> Sugar Land, Texas
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